Politics

I’m a life-long Democrat who is exceptionally proud of our party. I had the tremendous honor of serving as chairman of the Democratic National Committee under President Bill Clinton. The values of the Democratic Party are central to who I am—treating every American the way we all want to be treated, looking out to ensure that the American Dream is available to all. 

From my vantage point, today’s most crucial civil and human rights battle is how we treat our gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender citizens. Doing the right thing here is at the core of what our Party should stand for. That’s why I am joining Freedom to Marry, 22 Democratic senators, Leader Nancy Pelosi, and more than 35,000 Americans in urging the Party to include a freedom to marry plank in the platform that will be ratified at the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte this September. 

The United States has huge unpaid bills coming due for its infrastructure. A generation of investments in world-class infrastructure in the mid-twentieth century is now reaching the end of its useful life. Cost estimates for modernizing run as high as $2.3 trillion or more over the next decade for transportation, energy, and water infrastructure. Yet public infrastructure investment, at 2.4 percent of GDP, is half what it was fifty years ago.

Congress has done little to address this growing crisis, as evidenced by the ongoing political fiasco over key infrastructure legislation—the surface transportation authorization bill, also known as the highway bill. Historically a model of bipartisan cooperation, transportation funding is now the latest casualty of Tea Party extremism in the House of Representatives.

What makes the highway bill so important? For starters, it represents thousands of jobs for the beleaguered construction sector, which saw its unemployment rate rise to 17.2 percent in March, twice the rate of overall unemployment. Just as important, it is exactly the kind of comprehensive legislation we need to guide strategic, long-term investments. It is the largest source of federal infrastructure spending, allocating hundreds of billions of dollars over several years for highways, rapid transit, and rail.

Oftentimes, the easiest course of action for any legislator is to avoid controversial issues at all costs and when they arise, simply vote no. This minimizes a member of Congress’ exposure and decreases the chances the issue – any issue – is used against them when seeking re-election, whether its every two or six years. But unfortunately, this does not serve the citizenry well as important and difficult issues go unaddressed and our nation and its future generations are ill-served as they are handed problems their predecessors let languish.

This scenario is rampant in Washington, D.C. today. Whether it’s the $15 trillion debt, solvency of entitlements such as Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid, or immigration reform, Congress has not stepped forward. And this problem is not isolated to the 112th Congress, it is indicative of how the institution has functioned for quite some time under the control of both parties. If unemployment was six percent and prosperity in abundance, few would mind, much less notice. But those certainly are not the times we live in.

Unemployment has remained above eight percent more than three years, our dependence on foreign sources of energy has resulted in punishing costs at the pump, our monetary policy has led to a fall in the value of the dollar, the U.S. Senate has not passed a budget in more than 1,000 days and so many issues seem to require attention and resolution, yet nothing gets done.

Next year, if proposed new laws encumbering the federal regulatory process were enacted, more than 1,600 Ohioans would experience heart attacks, and children in Pennsylvania would experience over 84,000 additional asthma attacks. In Massachusetts, 200,000 additional cases of foodborne illnesses would occur if these measures became law.

These estimates for the consequences of rendering federal rulemaking more difficult were provided by Demos and the U.S. Public Interest Research Group in a series of reports released on Tuesday. The reports break down to the state level the implications of compromising the nation’s capacity to create necessary public protections. National level estimates of the damage caused by the federal government’s failure to regulate may be useful within the beltway, but these reports show us the effects at the level where people experience them.

For almost two years, the American system of regulatory protections has been under relentless attack. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has led the assault, supported mainly by Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate.

Prescription drug abuse is an epidemic that cannot be ignored. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, prescription drugs are now involved in more overdose deaths than heroin and cocaine combined. Physicians are serious about combating this epidemic, but we can’t do it alone.
 
The National All Schedules Prescription Electronic Reporting (NASPER) bill was signed into law in 2005 to give physicians an effective tool to help address drug diversion. This legislation was designed to create prescription drug monitoring programs (PDMPs) in each state so physicians could access important information to help them appropriately treat their patients’ pain or illness while helping to prevent the abuse and diversion of controlled substances. Unfortunately, the program was never fully funded and never realized its full potential.

In the current environment of politics, riding on the wake of the “Yo Decido” cover of TIME Magazine, both parties are noticeably vying to score points with Latino voters. The Republican party has been relying upon Florida Senator Marco Rubio to provide it Latino representation. With awareness of Mitt Romney’s harsh positions on immigration, especially on the DREAM Act, the party is increasingly looking to Rubio for support. An example of this support was apparent when Romney cited him as a Latino friend during his debate in Arizona to counteract the charge that he’s anti-Latino. Nevertheless, the GOP is paying the price for the Tea Party’s attack on immigrant communities and promotion of anti-immigrant policies.

President Obama leads Mitt Romney 70 percent to 14 percent among likely Latino voters. It is logical for a majority of Latinos to support Democrats since it has been Democrats who led passage of the DREAM Act in the House during the lame duck session, provided support for state dream acts, and have become public opponents of anti-immigrant state legislation.

Melanie Sloan recently took to The Hill to deliver a fact-free denunciation of my organization, the American Beverage Institute (ABI), and its stance on in-car interlock ignition devices, which detect alcohol consumption and prevent drivers from starting their vehicles.

Contrary to Ms. Sloan's drive-by assertions, the facts do support the claim that interlocks would inhibit the personal freedom of anyone who drinks responsibly and takes the wheel. Susan Ferguson, head of the federal program developing the technology, admits that the devices would be set below .08—making it nearly impossible for many people to have a drink or two before driving. And for proof that the government wants to see this technology as standard equipment in all cars, one need look no further than a Department of Transportation (DOT) Fact Sheet—since stripped from DOT’s website—asserting that “The goal over time is to equip all passenger vehicles in the United States with the technology.”

It’s Mothers Against Drunk Driving’s support for initiatives like this one, and other efforts that veer far from the group’s original mission, that have earned it criticism from its own founder and a “D” rating from the respected CharityWatch (formerly the American Institute of Philanthropy). MADD’s founder, meanwhile, has complimented ABI's work in helping in the ongoing fight against drunk driving.

Rep. Zoe Lofgren’s recent op-ed “Immigration detention is no ‘holiday’” doesn’t just distort the facts – it distorts my stance on human decency. She accuses me of wanting illegal immigrants “to suffer and remain vulnerable to sexual assault and death.” That is a blatant lie.

Unfortunately, those who support open borders often resort to name-calling and exaggerations, rather than sticking to the substance of the debate. Those who support the rule of law are not fanatics or lacking in compassion. We simply believe that the enforcement of our nation’s laws is not a choice, it’s a responsibility that the federal government too often shirks when it comes to illegal immigration. 

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There is plenty of blame going around for government inaction with respect to the most important issues facing our nation. The blamed include Super PACs, the media, the Republicans, the Democrats, President Obama, Speaker Boehner and many others, each decried as the most significant perpetrators of our current government’s inefficiency and inaction.

The big culprits are actually the Founding Fathers who did two things: they intentionally created three co-equal branches of government to make certain that in America, no single entity could control the whole system. The disenfranchisement and tyranny experienced under the British monarchy made them especially concerned with limiting the power of the Executive thus the American system was a direct attempt to institutionalize a weaker central government. Other democratic forms of government such as parliamentary systems are not so shackled.

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President Barack Obama is at it again. The tax increase on the rich, that is.
 
The president used his Saturday radio address to demand Congress pass a tax increase on millionaires and billionaires. With virtually no chance his plan will be turned into legislation, Obama is sending it to Congress anyway.
 
Known as the “Buffet Rule” – and first proposed back in September 2011 – the tax plan is scheduled for a vote in the Senate on April 16. But it has no chance of passing in the Democratic-controlled chamber or even be considered in the GOP-controlled House. 

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